Hands On with GE/General Imaging Digital Cameras

So, we’ve known for a bit that the GE brand was getting into the digital camera business. And we know that the company who is making the cameras is called General Imaging. Well, I got to spend some time with the leadership team at General Imaging and play around with the cameras a bit. I’ll save full specs of each camera for a later date when I get more of a chance to digest the spec sheets.

Given the current level of competition in the digital camera market and the very serious pricing pressures in the Point and Shoot market, any newcomer to the digital camera market is going to meet some skepticism. General Imaging is no exception (at least in my opinion). Their product line is very complete and they have all of the features that you’ll find in most current Point and Shoot cameras. They also have pricing that will beat existing cameras with similar spec sheets. The brand (GE) is certainly a trusted one with very good relationships with the right retailers. You also have to think that GE, being the mature company that it is, will not be venturing into the digital camera business on a lark.

That said, they have a lot of ground to make up to get people to think of GE when buying a camera. They also don’t have anything that is terribly distinctive in their product line to generate more "buzz", so they’re going to have to work very hard on marketing and advertising.

GE will be rolling out four product lines. The A series is the entry-level line that takes AA batteries. The E series has a sleeker body, bumped up specs, and several E series cameras have 3 inch LCDs. The G1 camera is a slim ultra-compact that is available in multiple colors. Finally, the X1 camera is their more advanced camera with manual exposure modes, a longer zoom, and optical image stabilization.

The entry level cameras (A730 and A830) are 7 and 8 megapixels, respectively, with 3x optical zooms and 2. 5 inch LCDs. These cameras will break the $150 mark.

(view large image)

There are four E series cameras that feature 8MP, 10MP or 12MP resolutions, differing optical zooms and several with 3 inch LCDs. For example, the E850 is an 8MP camera with 5x optical zoom and 3 inch screen. Which, by the way, is supposed to be under $200.